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Lobby groups petition appeals court for full rehearing in latest challenge to Title II reclassification.
USTelecom and CTIA late last week filed legal challenges to the appeals court ruling that upheld the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC’s) net neutrality rules.
In June, two members of a three-judge panel at the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled in favour of the FCC’s Open Internet order, which reclassifies broadband as a utility service under Title II of the Communications Act.
On Friday, USTelecom and CTIA filed a petition seeking an en banc review of the net neutrality rules. An en banc review is when a case is reheard by all the court’s judges, rather than just a select panel.
"Two judges on the appeals court failed to recognise the significant legal failings of the FCC’s decision to regulate the Internet as a public utility. USTelecom has asked for an en banc review to help ensure that the FCC does not give itself authority – which Congress has not granted – to impose heavy-handed regulation on Internet access," said USTelecom president Walter McCormick, in a statement.
In a separate petition, CTIA described the net neutrality rules as a power grab by the FCC, and said the panel was "seriously wrong" to authorise it.
"It comes as no surprise that the big dogs have challenged the three-judge panel’s decision," said FCC chairman Tom Wheeler, in a statement.
"We are confident that the full court will agree with the panel’s affirmation of the FCC’s clear authority to enact its strong Open Internet rules, the reasoned decision-making upon which they are based, and the adequacy of the record from which they were developed," he said.
